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THEBIGONE

W H AT ’ S I N T H E G U I D E ?WHAT

BUILDINGS WILL FALL DOWN?

HOW WILL WE GET

AROUND?

STITCHING THE SAFETY

NET

HOW TO SAVE YOUR

HOUSE

WHAT WILL WE

EAT?

INTERVIEW: THE WOMAN

PROTECTING US

HOW WILL WE

COMMUNICATE?

MAKING A FAMILY

PLAN

YOUR ONE-WEEK

SURVIVAL KIT

THE BIG

WAVE

The Cascadia Subduction

Quake is coming.

How bad will it be? Bad.

(Maybe the worst natural

disaster in US history.)

Can we prepare? YES!

JULY P 77

A S U R V I VA L G U I D E

BY RANDY GRAGGILLUSTRATIONS BY NOMAD

78 P O R T L A N D M O N T H LY

JULY 2014

TICK. TOCK.

THINK OF OREGON GEOLOGY

as a clock, measuring time

in earthquakes—40 major

coastal quakes over the

last 10,000 years. Tick: a

magnitude 8 on the Richter

scale. (Bigger than the quake

that killed 63 people in the

Bay Area in 1989.) Tock: a

magnitude 9. (Same as the

2011 quake that killed almost

16,000 in Japan.) On aver-

age, a major quake uncorks

in this area every 243 years,

the last one on January 26,

1700—314 years ago.

Right. We’re overdue.

When the next Big One

does happen, a 700-mile

chunk of tectonic plate

known as the Juan de

Fuca, stretching from Brit-

ish Columbia to Northern

California, will slide beneath

the North American plate,

causing the entire Northwest

coastline to sink by up to

6.6 feet. The resulting quake

won’t be a California-style

short blast of energy along

a fault line in the earth’s

upper crustal zone. It will

be bigger, deeper, and

longer: 3–4 minutes, with

potentially dozens of

aftershocks, some very

powerful, for days, even

months, later. Hillsides will slide. Build-

ings will collapse. Roads

will buckle. High-rises will

sway. Bridges will crack.

Some will fall. Pipes will

snap. Within 20 minutes,

the first of several 40-foot

tsunami waves will wash

the Oregon Coast’s low-

lying towns away.

If our next “subduction

zone” quake unleashes

its full potential, it will be

the worst natural disaster

in US history. But there

are crucial steps we can

take, as individuals, fami-

lies, and a community.

Preparation may mean

the difference between

finding your loved ones

or not; between sleeping

inside your mildly dam-

aged house or on a cot in

a refugee center; between

going hungry and thirsty

for days or managing until

supplies arrive. And, yes:

between living and dy-

ing. For the Northwest,

preparedness could mean

the difference between

bouncing back in years

or not bouncing back for

decades. Officials are working

hard on the problem. More

than 160 scientists, engi-

neers, and infrastructure

managers volunteered

thousands of hours of time

to develop the Oregon

Resiliency Plan, a blueprint

for averting the worst

scenarios and a quicker

recovery. “[B]usiness as

usual,” the panel con-

cluded, “implies a post-

earthquake future that

could consist of decades

of economic and popula-

tion decline—in effect, a

‘lost generation’ that will

devastate our state and

ripple beyond Oregon to

affect the regional and

national economy.”With their recommen-

dations in mind, here’s

a guide to what’s being

done and what all of us

should do. The Big One is

inevitable—right now, or

50 years from now. What

happens before and after

is up to us.

Survival Guide!1

WHAT BUILDINGS WILL FALL DOWN?WE LIKE OLD BUILDINGS and have a perennially weak economy. Result: Port-land has about 1,800 “unreinforced masonry” (i.e., old brick) buildings, more than 40 of them schools or day cares. If not retrofitted, they are all likely to col-lapse. More modern steel and concrete buildings will stand, but that doesn’t mean they’ll be safe to enter or use post-quake. What’s more, building codes as-sume short, quick, California-style quakes. How Portland’s modern buildings will fare in a subduction event’s longer shake isn’t well understood. The best seismic build-ing system is called “base isolation,” in which buildings slide atop pads within a kind of tub. Japan has 6,400 base-isolat-ed buildings that remained functional after the 2011 quake. Portland has one: Pioneer Courthouse, retrofitted in 2005.

WHAT WE’VE DONE: In 2012, Portland voters passed a $482 million bond to improve schools, much of it planned for seismic retrofitting. A 1998 bond al-lowed the Portland Fire Bureau to ret-rofit or rebuild all 30 of its facilities for the strongest earthquakes. The bureau also now has “urban search and rescue” squads on both sides of the river trained to find people in rubble. Multnomah County is in the process of planning how to choose shelter locations in the after-math. “One of the biggest challenges in disaster planning is making a plan based on what people will do, not what you want them to do,” says Alice Busch, emergency manager for the Department of County Human Services.

WHAT WE SHOULD DO: Steve Novick, the city council’s most aggressive prepared-ness proponent, wants urban renewal funds to retrofit the Pearl District and Old Town. Portland lets developers build big-ger if they install eco-roofs, locker rooms, family-size apartments, and 15 other “bo-nus” options. Resiliency planners recom-mend adding similar incentives to en-courage earthquake-ready buildings.

Duck. Cover. Hold on! (A subduction earthquake can last 3 minutes or more.)

Find a desk, table, or doorjamb to get under.

In a high-rise, move against an interior wall.

If outside, move away from trees, signs, power lines, and buildings.

On a city sidewalk, duck into a doorway to avoid falling brick and glass.

If driving, pull over. Stay in your car. Avoid bridges and structures that can collapse.

Inside a store, move away from shelves; don’t head for the door.

Inside a theater, duck below the back of the chair. —PETER HOLMSTROM

2 WHAT ABOUT MY HOUSE?WOOD-FRAME HOUSES generally fare well in earthquakes. But of Portland’s estimated 152,000 single-family homes, 70 percent were built before the first seismic code in 1978. That means they probably are not bolted to their foundations—and will thus rattle off and be largely uninhabitable.

WHAT WE’VE DONE: With $100,000 in FEMA funds, Novick started a pilot program for 22 homeowners to bolt their houses down. He also did his own. Cost:

$4,000. So did Carmen Merlo, director of the city’s emergency bureau, whose com-plicated foundation necessitated lifting her house. Cost: $25,000.

WHAT WE SHOULD DO: Just do it. An-choring most homes costs no more than $5,000. “If Phil Knight decided he cared more about earthquakes than curing cancer,” Novick quips, “he could pay for almost everybody to bolt their houses to their foundations.” Novick wants to require earthquake readiness disclosure for any home sale. (Astoria requires disclosures in known landslide areas.) He also is explor-ing requiring automatic gas shutoff valves in new construction. (LA already does.) Find more: portlandoregon.gov/bds/53562

WHEN THE SHAKING STARTS . . .

79P O R T L A N D M O N T H LYJULY 2014

REALITY CHECK

Possible deaths:650–6,000

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Survival Guide!

Portland’s popula-tion: 600,000. Profes-sional emergency responders: 1,700. Do the math.

“You shouldn’t expect the knight in shining armor to come in and rescue you,” says Marcel Rodriguez. “If you’re going to be rescued, it’s going to be by your neighbors.”

Rodriguez, a 47-year-old mergers and acquisitions specialist, joined the Riverdale–Tryon Creek Neighborhood Emergency Team (NET) a decade ago. Trained by the city-run program in basic first aid, fire sup-pression, rescue, and other handy skills, he and the 663 other local NET members covering 95 neigh-borhoods plan to offer cohesion amid chaos. Yet according to city emergency director Carmen Merlo, we still need more—way more. San Francisco, she points out, has 16,000 trained volunteers.

Anyone 14 or older can join a NET by completing an online training course of 17 introductory videos and undergo-ing a mandatory background check. Then comes a seven-session course, culminating in a four-hour exercise in the field. There is also an intensive version, given in three, all-day Saturday sessions.

“We don’t need everyone to be a ‘doomsday prepper,’” says Rodriguez. “Just tackle the small scale: make sure your family is safe, then your neighbors, then your neighbors’ neighbors, and go from there. Having a basic plan and some basic skills gets you a foothold.” Find more info: preporegon.org/NET —PH

4WHAT WILL WE EAT? “PORTLAND’S DIY MENTALITY will help,” says Merlo. “The people who preserve their own food, ride bikes, catch rain wa-ter, raise chickens, and garden will thrive after an earthquake.”

Yes, it’s that bad. Consider:

1. The quake will shake the whole North-west, from British Columbia to California.

2. Grocery and “big-box” stores built be-fore the 1995 seismic-code upgrade are likely to suffer severe damage, according to Oregon planners.

3. I-5 bridges, highways, and railroad lines may not be passable.

4. Only one Port of Portland terminal (6) has been seismically retrofitted.

5. Anyway, the post-quake tsunami (see page 94) is likely to devastate the jetties at the Columbia River’s mouth, making the famously tricky bar crossing even more treacherous. Dikes and pilings pro-tecting the river’s shipping lanes could collapse, making the lanes impassable.

6. Portland International Airport sits on the kind of loose fill that turns to jelly—a phenomenon known as liquefaction—in an earthquake.

7. FEMA’s primary emergency response airport is in Redmond, 145 miles away.

WHAT WE’VE DONE: Multnomah County has developed a task force—govern-ments, restaurants, homeless organiza-tions, churches, and others—to respond. “We’re on the cutting edge,” says Alice Busch of the county’s human services department. “We’re encouraging people to be self-reliant.”

WHAT WE SHOULD DO: Retrofit critical routes. Create an inventory of World War II–style temporary bridges. Stock up (see sidebar, page 92). Befriend a neighbor who makes kimchi. Could come in handy.

3 HOW WILL WE GET AROUND?BY FOOT, BIKE, AND BOAT, MOSTLY. The region’s quake plan-ners agree: people will be stuck where they are for quite some time. Prepare to bond with the people you’re with—whoever they are—or get walking.

BRIDGES Top-heavy, counterweighted lift spans like the Hawthorne, Steel, and Interstate will likely collapse. So will ramps leading to just about all the bridges.

ROADS Vast swaths of the city’s roadways, built on fill and alluvial deposits, will crack and sink.

THE TUNNEL Highway 26’s West Hills Tunnel was built before seismic codes. It may prove impassable.

THE GEAR All of the city’s road-clearing equipment is stored beneath the certain-to-collapse Fremont Bridge ramps. Seemed like a good idea at the time!

THE FUEL Most of Oregon’s fuel supply arrives to the “Critical Energy Infra-structure Hub,” a six-mile stretch of fuel storage tanks and refineries next to the Willamette River between the St. Johns and Fremont Bridges—all built atop vulnerable fill and alluvial deposits. Several multinational energy companies are involved; some have seismically upgraded some of these facilities, others have not. Most fuel gets here by way of a single, vintage 1960s pipe from Washing-ton—owned and operated by BP—beneath the Columbia and Willamette Rivers. The movement of the rivers could cause the pipe to snap. In other words, peak oil (and natural gas) may come a little early.

STANDING SPANS The soon-to-be finished Tilikum Crossing and Sellwood Bridge are both built to withstand major earthquakes, as is the aerial tram.

THE BOATS The Portland Spirit, tugs, and other rivercraft will become ferries.

THE HQ Novick is pushing for $2.2 million to seismically update the city’s vehicle and equipment fuel storage tanks and open a new west-side emergency man-agement center and equipment storage facility, possibly in the decommissioned SFC Jerome F. Sears Army Reserve Center.

JOIN THE SAFETY NET

80 P O R T L A N D M O N T H LYJULY 2014

REALITY CHECK

Bridges on US 101 likely to collapse:56

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What should everyone do to prepare? Peo-ple should talk to family members about how to communicate if the cell phones are down, where they will go—their own family emer-gency plan. Then get a kit together: stockpile some extra water, food, medical supplies.

What about the idea that we should all be ready to be off-grid for 72 hours? Is that enough? Absolutely not. Seventy-two hours is OK for the California-style 30-second earth-quakes—but not the kind that we’re expecting here. People should stockpile as much as they possibly can. We say, at minimum, enough for one week. It may be hard financially and space-wise. Partnering with your neighbors and others can make it more manageable. Several people in a neighborhood can go in on a Costco membership. The person with the largest house or basement can store the food.

Beyond planning with our families, what should we do as citizens? In parts of the world that have experienced catastrophe, one indicator of how resilient a community is social cohesion. Getting to know your neighbors and communities will really add to our resilience and the ability to help each other. We’d also like to see the number of our trained volunteers increase exponentially.

What do you fear most? A catastrophic fail-ure of not only the landline system, but also the cellular system. When emergency re-sponders can’t communicate with each oth-er, when families can’t get into contact with one another—that’s a very chaotic situation. Next, some people, because of where they are, will be stranded in one place for a while. They won’t be able to get their children from school, or go home or to work because of the damage to the road infrastructure. And, of course, there’s casualties.

Some estimates forecast a death toll in the thousands. You don’t think it will be so high. Why? I don’t mean to minimize this, but the Christchurch, New Zealand, quake in 2011 “only” caused a couple of hundred deaths. That was a smaller-magnitude quake, but it

was right under them. The Cascadia subduc-tion zone is capable of a magnitude 9 earth-quake, but what we feel here in Portland won’t be a 9. Time of day will make a difference. If it’s during the school day, we have a lot of chil-dren in very vulnerable buildings. If it happens at night, the casualty count would go drasti-cally down. That’s only for the earthquake. The earthquake and the tsunami are a different matter. You’re going to visit Christchurch in Octo-ber. What do you want to learn? Portland de-veloped about the same time as Christchurch. We’re a little bigger, but a lot of geography and building stock is quite similar. A large portion of Christchurch’s central business district can no longer be developed. We have something similar here: a large part of the city along the riverfront, which is liquefiable soils,

may no longer be able to be developed. There are lessons that we can apply here.

When does the prospect of an earthquake haunt you most? It’s changed my driving hab-its, and where I shop. I live and work on the east side, but used to go to the Costco in Southwest Portland. Now I only go to the Costco in North-east. I’m hardwired to think of the worst-case scenario.

Can Portland rise to the occasion? People in Portland, whether they know it or not, are more resilient than in other parts of the country. People here tend to be more out-doorsy, and camp a lot. We have sturdy boots and cooking stoves. We have a high level of volunteerism. That social cohesion will help people—not just to respond to the earth-quake, but also to recover quickly.

Q&A / Carmen Merlo

The Earthquake Planner

WITH AN EASYGOING SMILE and a Chevy Tahoe stocked with everything from waders to a stash of ramen, Carmen Merlo possesses the calm you want in a doctor, platoon leader, big sister—or the person who will manage the city’s recov-ery after an earthquake. Since becoming director of Portland’s Bureau of Emer-gency Management in 2007, Merlo has shaped our preparations for the Big One. For her, being ready means stocking up on water and food, for sure. But it also means imagining how family and neighbors will connect—and choosing a new Costco.

PHOTOGRAPH BY WILLIAM ANTHONY 81P O R T L A N D M O N T H LYJULY 2014

5 WHAT WILL WE DRINK?BEFORE BULL RUN, booze was safer to drink than water. Turn the clock back. Your faucets (and toilets) will be dry for weeks, maybe months. The Bull Run dams are expected to survive, but 65 percent of the city’s water mains are brittle cast iron. Reservoirs will crack; treatment facilities and pump stations will fail. The result: a total loss of wa-ter pressure—both for drinking and for putting out fires. For the first couple of weeks, water will have to be pumped, purified, and trucked. Firefighters will pump the Willamette into 10,000-gallon tank trucks, or directly to fires with Port-land’s three fireboats. Sewers will fail. Bucket-flushing toilets at home will only clog the system. Going au naturel, over time, will pollute the ground supply and river. Figure on a year to flush.

WHAT WE’VE DONE: The Portland Wa-ter Bureau has strengthened one conduit from Bull Run, with plans to update the other two in the five-year budget. New tanks completed at Powell Butte and Kelly Butte by next year and at Washing-ton Park by 2020 (replacing the beloved open-air reservoirs) will be quake-proof, and the new Tilikum Crossing and Sell-wood Bridge both carry water lines.

WHAT WE SHOULD DO: Upgrading the entire system would be like rebuilding the city. Planners recommend a “back-bone” of new pipes to critical care facili-ties, firefighting nodes, and distribution points. Next step: within five years, the Water Bureau will begin a $56.6 million seismically “hardened” water line across the Willamette. At home, invest in a stor-age tank or water purifier (see sidebar, left). The Portland group Public Hygiene Lets Us Stay Human (phlush.org) out-lines an emergency “two bucket” toilet system to maintain hygiene.

The Portland Earthquake Survival KitWe should prepare to spend at least one

week off the grid. (Maybe six months.) Get

ready for your most rustic staycation ever!

A MINIMUM OF ONE GALLON OF WATER PER PERSON, PER DAY, STORED IN FIVE-GALLON CONTAINERS. APARTMENT DWELLERS MIGHT CONSIDER A LIFESTRAW PERSONAL WATER FILTER ($20). HOME-DWELLERS WITH WATER HEATERS, SAY HELLO TO YOUR NEW DRINKING FOUNTAINS.

COOKING UTENSILS AND A MANUAL CAN OPENER

COPIES OF VITAL DOCUMENTS: BIRTH CERTIFICATES, INSURANCE POLICIES, WILLS, BANK ACCOUNT INFO, ETC.

BLANKETS AND/OR SLEEPING BAGS, PERHAPS A TENT

DECK OF CARDS? HARMONICA? THE CANTERBURY TALES? SOME-THING, FOR SURE

NEEDED PRESCRIPTION DRUGS, PLUS OVER-THE-COUNTER PAIN-KILLERS

HEAVY-DUTY PLASTIC BAGS (FOR WASTE AND TO SERVE AS TARPS) AND DUCT TAPE

IN A SIX-MONTH SCENARIO, FIVE PEOPLE WOULD NEED AT LEAST 900 GALLONS OF WATER. THOU-SAND-GALLON STORAGE TANKS CAN BE HAD FOR $500.

IF HOME AND WORK ARE ON OP-POSITE SIDES OF THE RIVER, KEEP A SMALL WORKPLACE OR CAR KIT.

CHARCOAL OR PROPANE FOR OUT-DOOR COOKING. A BAYOU CLAS-SIC 12-INCH DOUBLE JET COOKER FROM LOWES ($60) CAN BE USED IN THE MEANTIME FOR CAMPING!

AT LEAST 14 SERVINGS OF FOOD PER PERSON (CANNED, DRIED, OR OTHER LONG-LASTING FOODSTUFFS)

COMFORTABLE, WARM CLOTHING, INCLUDING EXTRA SOCKS, AND RAIN GEAR SUCH AS A PONCHO

EXTRA BATTERIES, MULTIPLE FLASHLIGHTS, LIGHT STICKS

A 12- TO 15-INCH ADJUSTABLE PIPE OR CRESCENT WRENCH, FOR TURN-ING OFF WATER AND GAS (LEARN HOW: NWNATURAL.COM AND PORTLANDOREGON.GOV/WATER)

WORK GLOVES AND PROTECTIVE GOGGLES

ADD A WHISTLE TO YOUR KEY CHAIN—IT COULD BE A LIFE SAVER IF YOU’RE TRAPPED IN RUBBLE.

82 P O R T L A N D M O N T H LYJULY 2014

FOR THE RESPONSIBLE CITIZEN

HAND-CRANK RADIO. (AMBIENT WEATHER WR-11B OFFERS THE SWISS ARMY KNIFE OF AM/FM/NOAA DIGITAL RADIOS FOR $40.)

COSTCO SELLS A “ONE PERSON, ONE YEAR” FOOD KIT. 9,697 SERV-INGS. $1,500. GOOD FOR DECADES.

AN INCINERATING TOILET? UP TO $3,000? GOOGLE IT. —PH

FOR THE SERIOUS PREPPER

Survival Guide!

7AND, ER, THIS TSUNAMI?THE JAPANESE EARTHQUAKE in 2011 generated tsunami waves up to 132 feet high, washing over areas in which nearly 300,000 people lived. The Northwest’s wave will be comparatively shallow at up to 30–40 feet. But the 22,000 full-time residents who live in the areas the tsunami will flood—plus tourists—will have just 15–20 minutes to get themselves to higher ground. Consider Seaside, where 83 percent of the population and almost 100 percent of the city’s critical facilities are in the tsunami zone. (The state geology department offers a trove of maps and other information: oregongeology.org/tsuclearinghouse.) For people in the inundation zone, any possessions not on their backs (or in storage outside the flooded zone) will be gone. And, thanks to crumbling bridges and landslides, they will be cut off from the east side of the Coast Range for weeks—maybe months.

In other words, if you’re on the coast when the Big One hits, your stay may prove longer than you planned.

WHAT WE’VE DONE: Waldport, Lincoln County, Cannon Beach, and Seaside are laying plans to move schools. Between 2000 and 2010, more than 50 percent of growth in coastal communi-ties has been outside of the tsunami zone.

WHAT WE SHOULD DO: Relocate all of the coast’s critical facilities outside the tsunami zone and make at least some of them tsunami-resistant. Use hotel room–tax funding to bankroll education campaigns and evacuation plans for tourists. And for you weekenders: pack a lightweight survival kit for your next coastal vacation.

6HOW WILL WE COMMUNICATE?SMOKE SIGNALS! Kidding. Well, maybe.

Phoning within the city, checking Face-book, and doing business may be difficult for weeks. Vulnerabilities range from ma-jor fiber lines running underground and over those damned bridges to wireless antennas sitting on liquefaction soils or on buildings that will collapse or be unus-able. According to the Oregon Resiliency Plan’s analysis, restoring full communica-tions will take up to three months.

WHAT WE’VE DONE: The city has estab-lished a network of 48 Basic Earthquake Emergency Communication Nodes that will be deployed in red-and-white tents in parks and open spaces throughout the city to receive shortwave radio transmissions.

WHAT WE SHOULD DO: Get to know your neighbors, so when the shaking stops you have the beginnings of a cohesive com-munity. Figure out the planned site of the nearest emergency node—find maps via portlandoregon.gov/pbem. Designate a family contact outside the western states. And see our sidebar, page 90, on how to join the city’s network of trained emer-gency volunteers.

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Estimated cost in Oregon:

$32 billionTHE FAMILY PLANWhen the big shake comes, you’re going to want to con-nect with your brood as quickly as possible.

Sit down with your family and/or friends to discuss what to do. Imagine different times of day and sce-narios—particularly who will be on what side of the river.

Set up at least two places to meet: one outside of your home, the other outside of your neighborhood.

Designate a contact—outside of Portland. Phone lines within and into the city will be jammed. Out-bound calls, however, should be easier to make, particularly to other regions of the country. Aunt Myrtle in Kansas, or your college roommate who lives in Manhattan, can become a central information hub.

Know your evacu-ation routes! Port-land’s emergency planners have devel-oped hazard maps for every neighborhood that include evacua-tion routes, hospital locations, and other emergency services. Find your neigh-borhood map here: portlandoregon.gov/pbem/58572#maps

Have family docu-ments organized and ready to grab and go. That means Social Security cards, insur-ance information, passports, and birth certificates.

Get some bikes. Fuel might be tight for days, even months. You’ll need to get around. And what’s more fun than family bike rides? We won’t have Netflix for a while. —PH